2008 - The team behind IGF Student Showcase finalist Narbacular Drop is hired by Valve. The game is reworked into Portal and goes on to win the coveted Game Developer's Choice "Best Game" award for 2008, as well as numerous game of the year accolades.

2008 - Design Innovation winner Braid debuts on Xbox Live Arcade to significant success.
2008 - Excellence in Audio winner Audiosurf launches on Valve's Steam distribution service and goes on to become the highest selling game of February, outselling even Valve's own Orange box (including Team Fortress 2 and Game Developer's Choice "Best Game" winner Portal.)

2007 - Design Innovation winner Everyday Shooter is signed by Sony for distribution on the PlayStation 3's PlayStation Network, after Sony's John Hight plays the game at the IGF Pavilion during GDC 2007 - Everyday Shooter's Jon Mak also appears at the inaugural Independent Games Summit.

March 4, 2015

The celestial exploration game Outer Wilds, from developer Team Outer Wilds, received top honors this evening at the 17th Annual Independent Games Festival.

In addition to taking home the Seumas McNally Grand Prize for Best Independent Game (and its associated $30,000 cash prize), Outer Wilds -- an innovative intergalactic adventure in which players probe the depths of space and unravel the mysteries of the cosmos -- was also honored with the Excellence in Design award.

Capybara Games co-founder Nathan Vella returned to serve as master of ceremonies for the event, which also featured appearances from IGF chairman Brandon Boyer and videos from the comedic minds behind the Hey Ash Whatcha Playin'? video series.

February 2, 2015

Game Developers Conference organizers are happy to announce that voting for theIndependent Games Festival (IGF) Audience Award is now open through February 9th, 2015 at 11:59 PM PT.

This Audience Award represent an opportunity for the gaming public to weigh in and cast a vote for their favorite nominee. Anyone who would like to vote for the IGF Audience Award can visit the links below, select the name of the game they'd like to vote for from a list of nominees, and enter a valid email address -- voters will then receive an email to confirm their vote.

January 22, 2015

The Independent Games Festival is pleased to announce the winners for the ninth annual Student Showcase, which celebrates the brightest and most innovative creations to come out of universities and games programs from around the world in the past year, in advance of the 17th annual presentation of its prestigious awards.

This year's showcase of top student talent include the fast-paced "five minutes or less" real-time strategy game Interloper from Dutch student development team Monogon Games, the stark, fast-paced falling action game Downwell from a student developer at Tokyo's University of the Arts, and strikingly topical arcade-style experience Rooftop Cop, a game from NYU Tisch School of the Arts student Stephen Lawrence Clark, which challenges people to play through a collection of five vignettes about a police force that has forgotten who they are meant to police -- and why.

January 7, 2015

The Independent Games Festival (IGF) juries have announced the Main Competition finalists for its prestigious 17th annual awards, honoring the most influential and outstanding development in independent video games. The IGF has nominated over 30 extraordinary game titles released in the past year.

This year's finalists are led by various standout titles nominated for multiple awards, including inkle's globe-trotting interactive fiction game 80 Days, Croteam's philosophical first-person puzzle game The Talos Principleand the brutally earnest wartime survival simulator This War Of Minefrom 11 Bit Studios.

January 5, 2015

The juries behind GDC 2015's Independent Games Festival continue to take form with an exciting lineup of highly lauded developers and industry professionals to decide the finalists for the awards this March.

These are Excellence in Visual Arts, and Excellence in Audio Awards, and our special Nuovo award, recognizing excellence in shorter-form, more esoteric games. The remaining juries being announced today are as follows:

December 19, 2014

Proceedings are well underway for the jurying phase of the 2015 Independent Games Festival, in which discipline-specific experts play and discuss the merits of the nearly 650 games entered in the 2015 Festival Main Competition, all of which continue to push the boundaries of video game development and design.

As in prior years, an extraordinary group of game development notables are evaluating IGF 2015's standout entries. Today we're happy to begin to announce members of some of these discipline-specific jury panels.

After first-round IGF judging from more than 200 helpers, these panels -- composed of creators from studios both large and small -- will ultimately determine the finalists and winners of the various IGF 2015 awards at Game Developers Conference 2015.

Below are the jurors who have volunteered their time and talent for the Excellence in Design Award, and Excellence in Audio Award, in alphabetical order:

November 26, 2014

The 17th annual Independent Games Festival -- the longest-running and largest independent games festival worldwide -- is months away, and today officials are proud to announce another year of record entries for IGF 2015's Student Competition.

This year's Student Competition, which will display finalists and show winners at Game Developers Conference 2015 in March, took in over 360 game entries across all platforms -- console, PC and mobile -- from a broad array of the world's most prestigious universities, games programs, and high schools.

Together with the Main Competition submissions, this year's IGF has taken in over 1,000 entries total -- once again surpassing the festival's record across the Main and Student Competitions.

November 10, 2014

Earlier today, one of our returning judges and jurors resigned from the festival following an extensive campaign from third parties regarding a tweet that was made some days ago -- claims about which we had already investigated and very quickly found to be made entirely in jest -- and we'd like to now offer an apology for and a clarification on our response.

One of the reasons we invite hundreds of judges to take part in the first round of the IGF process is explicitly so that we can have a diversity of opinion from developers of games both large and small, academics, journalists, and other representatives of games culture at large. We believe that it's only through this diversity that the IGF can properly represent and celebrate the advancement and evolution of the medium, as more voices broaden the idea of what games can be.

November 4, 2014

The 17th annual Independent Games Festival -- the longest-running and largest showcase for independent developers -- recently closed its call for submissions, and officials are proud to announce the festival has seen more than 600 entries for its Main Competition once again.

October 17, 2014

Developers, don't forget: The Main Competition submission deadline for the 2015 Independent Games Festival ends next week on Wednesday (10/22) at 11:59PM PDT.

The Independent Games Festival is the signature competition for indie games, to be held for a 17th year during GDC 2015 in San Francisco next March. This directly follows a record-breaking year which saw nearly 900 entries for the 2014 event, including top prizewinners like Device 6, The Stanley Parable, Gorogoa and Papers, Please.

September 19, 2014

The Independent Games Festival China has revealed the Main Competition and Student finalists for its 2014 award ceremony, which celebrates the most creative indie games from throughout the Pan-Pacific area.

The GDC China co-located event is now in its fifth year, and this time around the finalists include indie games such as the rhythmic puzzler Duet, Q-Games' multiplayer open-world platformer Nom Nom Galaxy and more.

September 8, 2014

You may have recently seen some odd claims of collusion between independent developers/funders & both the Independent Games Festival and Indiecade, most recently with untrue allegations that select independent developers have worked to 'fix' both award events.

The IGF (and its parent company, which has looked into these claims) would like to assure all entrants and gamers that we take the idea of conflict of interest seriously in selecting our judging and jurying pools. Worries about the Independent Games Festival are nothing new (thanks to its perceived 'star-making' qualities), but for those who are unaware, we'll explain again how the process works.

The explanation below is the process we've had in place since 2011, and, in the interest of transparency, it will be officially added to our FAQ in the coming days:

August 6, 2014

Submissions are now officially open for the 2015 Independent Games Festival, the signature competition for indie games, to be held for a 17th year during GDC 2015 in San Francisco next March. This directly follows a record-breaking year which saw nearly 900 entries for the 2014 event, including top prizewinners like Papers, Please, Luxuria Superbia and DEVICE 6.

The deadlines for the Main and Student Showcase categories for the 17th IGF are October 22th and October 31st, 2014 respectively, with finalists announced in January 2015. Finalists' games will once again be playable at the packed IGF Pavilion on the Game Developers Conference 2015 Expo Floor, and will compete for over $50,000 in prizes.

July 31, 2014

Hi everyone, and welcome again to the 2015 Independent Games Festival, our 17th annual ceremony celebrating the best in independent games. As you read this post, we will have just begun accepting submissions for this year's festival, which will remain open until Wednesday, October 22nd for our Main Competition, and October 31st for our Student Competition.

As usual, the festival will culminate with our awards show on Wednesday, March 4th, 2015, during Game Developers Conference 2015, located at the Moscone Center in San Francisco.

Typically, this is the bit of this blog post where I outline our changes to the festival, but after a few years of larger outward-facing policy shifts, this year we're holding steady with the same rules as 2014, and continuing to focus our enhancements on the backend that our entrants, judges and juries use, to make it easier than ever to submit, discover and rate the games we receive.

Interested in being a judge in IGF 2015?

With that said, we would like to extend the same invitation as we did late last year and open a call for new judges via this application form. We're always looking for more diverse voices to make up our judging body for both the Main and Student competition, and this form is your way of expressing your interest.

If you are involved in the games industry in any capacity and are not submitting a game to this year's festival, feel free to express your interest in becoming a judge by filling out this form. Please note that we can't guarantee all applications will be accepted -- if you've been selected, you'll receive an email from us when our judging process has begun.

If you have any questions about any of the detailed changes above, please don't hesitate to drop us an email at chairman@igf.com to discuss this further. Hope you're all having a great year, and we're all looking forward to seeing what you're all preparing for this year's Festival!

GDC China will once again host all three main elements of IGF China, including the Independent Games Summit, the IGF Pavilion, and the prestigious IGF China Awards.

Now in its sixth year, the IGF Summit at GDC China will feature sessions from some of the world's top developers, while the IGF Pavilion will showcase some of the region's best independent and student games.

March 20, 2014

Lucas Pope's Papers, Please won the Seumas McNally Grand Prize for Best Independent Game and its accompanying $30,000 cash prize this evening at the 16th Annual Independent Games Festival, which took place this evening as part of the 2014 Game Developers Conference at the Moscone Convention Center in San Francisco.

Pope's inventive and evocative game, centered around the protocols and moral challenges of working as an immigration agent under a dictatorial regime, was also honored for its achievements in Narrative and Design during the event.

Capybara Games co-founder and all-around charming fellow Nathan Vella served as master of ceremonies for the event, which featured appearances from IGF chairman Brandon Boyer and videos from the comedic minds behind the Hey Ash Whatcha Playin'? video series.

February 7, 2014

Gamasutra's Alex Wawro highlights more top-tier games that were nominated by jurors for this year's IGF, but didn't achieve the critical mass of votes necessary to be named a finalist.

In the wake of the IGF 2014 Main Competition finalists announcement, we've been working to shed some light on the selection process and highlight some of the games that didn't garner enough critical mass to be nominated as a finalist.

The main IGF competition has a panel of judges that includes representatives from the mainstream game industry, previous IGF winners and finalists, other independent game developers, and a smattering of indie-friendly game journalists.

As part of the agreement with Indie Giving, which is run by FGL head and indie community veteran Chris Hughes, generous indie game makers will get an exclusive opportunity to buy the now sold-out IGS pass.

By doing so they agree to volunteer on an onsite project just before GDC 2014, with 100 percent of their Indie Giving package price going directly to the Hands On Bay Area nonprofit and its partners.

January 29, 2014

Gamasutra's Alex Wawro highlights more top-tier games that were nominated by jurors for this year's IGF, but didn't achieve the critical mass of votes necessary to be named a finalist.

In the wake of the IGF 2014 Main Competition finalists announcement, we've been working to shed some light on the selection process and highlight some of the games that didn't garner enough critical mass to be nominated as a finalist.

Here's how it works: the main IGF competition has a diverse panel of judges that includes representatives from the mainstream game industry, previous IGF winners and finalists, other independent game developers, and a smattering of indie-friendly game journalists.

January 22, 2014

The Independent Games Festival has announced the eight Student Showcase winners for the 16th annual presentation of its prestigious awards, celebrating the brightest and most innovative creations to come out of universities and games programs from around the world in the past year.

This year's showcase of top student talent include the open-world cowboy whodunit Westerado from Dutch student developers Ostrich Banditos, the forced perspective puzzle game Museum of Simulation Technology from a student at Carnegie Mellon's Entertainment Technology Center, and strikingly topical co-op hacker game Cyber Heist, a game from students at the University of Utah which challenges a devious Thief/Hacker duo to work together and take down the U.S. Department of Education in 2114, eliminating student debt forever.

In total, this year's Student Competition took in nearly 350 game entries across all platforms -- PC, console and mobile -- from a wide diversity of the world's most prestigious universities and games programs, making the Student IGF one of the world's largest showcases of student talent.

January 14, 2014

Gamasutra's Alex Wawro highlights more top-tier games that were nominated by jurors for this year's IGF, but didn't achieve the critical mass of votes necessary to be named a finalist.

Now that the IGF 2014 Main Competition finalists have been announced, let's talk a bit more about the selection process.

The main IGF competition has a diverse panel of judges that includes representatives from the mainstream game industry, previous IGF winners and finalists, other independent game developers, and a smattering of indie-friendly game journalists.

January 7, 2014

The Independent Games Festival (IGF) juries have announced the Main Competition finalists for its prestigious 16th annual awards, honoring the most influential and outstanding development in independent video games. The IGF has nominated over 30 extraordinary game titles released in the past year.

Candidates for the 2014 IGF Awards were distributed to nearly 375 elite judges for evaluation. Expert juries specializing in distinct disciplines for each category then selected the IGF finalists following playthroughs and recommendations from the more than 650 IGF entrants. The numbers of entries have increased significantly from previous years, and are a testament to the growing popularity and importance of the IGF.

December 17, 2013

The juries behind GDC 2014's Independent Games Festival continue to take form with an exciting lineup of highly lauded developers and industry professionals to decide the finalists for the awards this March.

While the juries are still being finalized as we move toward selection of IGF finalists, here are the confirmed jurors for the Excellence in Visual Arts and Excellence in Audio Awards, in alphabetical order (you can see jurors in additional categories here):

December 9, 2013

GDC 2014's Independent Games Festival is shaping up to be one of the most exciting ever, thanks to hundreds of indie game developer entrants who are pushing the boundaries of video game development and design.

Some of the most notable people in game development will be evaluating IGF 2014's standout entries. Today we're happy to announce members of some of our discipline-specific jury panels. These panels -- composed of game industry professionals, notable independent game developers and former IGF award winners -- will determine the finalists and winners of the various IGF 2014 awards.

While the juries are still being finalized for other categories as we move toward selection of IGF finalists, here are the confirmed jurors for the Excellence in Narrative Award, Nuovo Award and Excellence in Design Award, in alphabetical order:

November 11, 2013

The organizers of the 16th annual Independent Games Festival -- the longest-running and largest festival relating to independent games worldwide -- are proud to announce another year of record entries for IGF 2014's Student Competition.

This year's Student Competition, which will display finalists and show winners at Game Developers Conference 2014, took in almost 350 game entries across all platforms -- PC, console and mobile -- from a wide variety of the most prestigious universities, games programs, and even high schools from around the world.

Together with the Main Competition submissions, this year's IGF has taken in over 1,000 total entries -- once again surpassing the festival's record across the Main and Student Competitions.

This year's Student Competition includes lauded entries such as University of Washington-developed and over 400% Kickstarted action platformer roguelike-like Risk of Rain and HKU University of the Arts Utrecht-developed Wild West action adventure Westerado.

October 24, 2013

The organizers of the 16th annual Independent Games Festival -- the longest-running and largest showcase for independent developers -- are proud to announce that the event has once again seen record entries for its latest Main Competition.

In total, the GDC 2014 co-located festival attracted 656 Main Competition entries from both established indie developers and first-time entrants, handily beating last year's high score of 589.

Some of the hundreds of promising titles entered in this year's IGF Main Competition include Stoic's turn-based strategy RPG The Banner Saga, Impromptu Games's puzzle platformer InFlux, and David S. Gallant'sI Get This Call Every Day.

October 4, 2013

The Independent Games Festival is the signature competition for indie games, to be held for a 16th year during GDC 2014 in San Francisco next March. This directly follows a record-breaking year which saw nearly 900 entries for the 2013 event, including top prizewinners like FTL: Faster Than Light, Cart Life, and Kentucky Route Zero.

The deadlines for the Main and Student Showcase categories are October 19th and October 31st, 2013, respectively, with finalists announced in January 2014. Finalists' games will be playable at the IGF Pavilion on the Game Developers Conference 2014 Expo Floor, and will compete for nearly $60,000 in prizes.

The Independent Games Festival is the longest-running and highest profile independent video game festival, summit and showcase. It has served as a springboard for several games that have gone on to become critical and cultural hits. Previous IGF prize winners from the past 16 years include Spelunky, Fez, Minecraft, Limbo, World of Goo, Braid, Castle Crashers, Everyday Shooter and many more of the game industry's breakthrough independent titles.

September 18, 2013

The fifth annual Independent Games Festival China has concluded, after some 250 entries were boiled down to a core 14 finalists, including eight for the main competition, and six student competition entries.

Entrants came from all over Asia and Australasia, from countries as diverse as Singapore, India, Taiwan, Australia, and indeed, China itself. The awards were judged by a team of five veterans, including Richard Tsao of Ubisoft Chengdu, Kevin Li of Tipcat interactive, and IGF chairman emeritus Simon Carless.

The ceremony, held on Monday the 16th in Shanghai, brought these various countries together under one roof, to celebrate the region's innovative spirit. Stage fright upon receipt of awards abounded, but that only added to the endearing nature of the general environment. Indeed, one nominee, Muhammad A.Moniem (Coated), brought his entire family with him to the event.

While only nine of the 14 finalists received awards, all were present at GDC China's IGF pavilion, and were a main attraction during the event's proceedings, alongside GDC China's independent games summit.

Without further ado, here are the winners of the 2013 IGF China awards: